Shit matters

Community led total sanitation may not sound like the most cutting edge medical science, but the potential impact of this initiative is huge.

Contact with faeces spreads human disease, and this technique helps villagers around the world understand how the practice of open defecation means that they're, literally, in the shit.

You can hear more from Kamal Kar, inventor of Community Led Total Sanitation on the BMJ podcast

Separate to this film, Shit Matters is the title of a book edited by Lyla Mehta and Synne Movik based on an IDS DFID funded research study on CLTS. The book looks more deeply into the challenges of the project regarding scaling up, inclusion of the poorest, and sustainability, by drawing on research in Bangladesh, India, and Indonesia. It also addresses the question of whether hopes for CLTS are exaggerated. Shit Matters is available to buy from the publisher Practical Action.

‘A “must read” for anyone who believes that a world in which over one billion people defecate in the open is a world not fit to live in.’
Sanjay Wijesekera, Team Leader: Water and Sanitation, DFID